up or expand their own programs. The Texas state Senate is pro-
posing to more than double its film largesse and spend $500 million to attract more productions. Among the actors who appeared in an ad for the program were Matthew McCo- naughey, Dennis Quaid, Woody Har- relson, Renée Zellweger, and Billy Bob Thornton. All of them claimed the money
would help them bring Texas stories to the big screen. They just needed a little government support to pull it off.
Some lawmakers want to draw the
line. GOP state Sen. Bob Hall notes that “we don’t have to pay other busi- nesses to come here.” He says film- makers should be willing to come
without subsidies because Texas has no state income tax, a wide array of locations, and a friendly business environment. Sadly, if they paid close attention,
they would see that these subsidies lose money. First, to pay for the revenue loss
that tax credits create, either spend- ing must be cut elsewhere or debt increased. Second, the economic benefits
of these films are exaggerated. The best-paying jobs go to talented actors, technicians, and workers who don’t live in the state where the film is made. The jobs filled by locals are usually
in lower-paid areas like hairdressing, catering, and
driving. But those jobs come at the cost of other jobs that would have existed if they hadn’t been taxed out of existence to subsidize the arts. Many productions misuse the pro-
gram to qualify for more credits. Audits of state film tax credits
routinely find they cost states more money than they draw in revenue. In Georgia, a 2023 audit found
that the state’s program cost its bud- get nearly $1 billion a year, yielding a return of just 19 cents on the dollar. Michigan’s film subsidy program
lost 89 cents for every dollar spent, according to an audit by the state Senate Fiscal Agency. New York’s audit estimated its tax
credits were “at best a break-even proposition and more likely a net cost.” It determined that the mod- est likely return on investment was between 15 and 31 cents on the dollar. Despite the generous subsidies, per-
mits for location shooting in New York are down 43% compared to what they were in 2019 before the pandemic. Louisiana concluded that its
benefits often flowed to out-of-state workers rather than stay in the local economy.
Massachusetts reported a high
cost per job created — over $324,000 per full-time equivalent position. But states — mostly blue — refuse
to learn the lesson. Democrat Gov. JB Pritzker has just expanded Illinois’ tax credit package. In New Jersey, Democrat Gov.
Money Down Toilet W
hen actor Timothée Chalamet made his way through a 1960s-era Greenwich Village in last year’s Bob Dylan biopic A Complete Unknown, he was actually
across the Hudson river in Hoboken, New Jersey, reports
Gothamist.com. That’s a problem for New York, which is planning to shell out $9 billion in tax
credits over the next 10 years to lure moviemakers to the Empire State. Critics point to a 2024 report that found that every dollar spent on the film tax
credit generated only a 31-cent return on investment. HBO received $846,000 in state tax credits for the third season of How to With
John Wilson. In the second-to-last episode of the man-on-the-street, comedic docuseries — how to find a public restroom — Wilson admitted to recreating an overflowing toilet on a soundstage explicitly to qualify for the credit, which generally does not apply to documentaries.
Phil Murphy boasts he has added so many tax incentives that Netflix is now a “studio partner” of the state — it gets a whopping 40% tax credit on qualifying expenses. When will states learn that the
best way to create jobs and boost investment is to create a business climate that benefits everyone with no special favors? Instead, the nation’s governors
and politicians want to play at being movie moguls. But the script for their failure is what’s really in pro- duction.
MAY 2025 | NEWSMAX 15
MOVIE SCENE/JOSE PEREZ/BAUER-GRIFFIN/GC IMAGES / NEW JERSEY SIGN/HANK MIKA/SHUTTERSTOCK
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